Ksara Caves return to Beirut cinema

Zahle morning walk until a taxi comes along to take us 10km south to Ksara Winery, a well-kept beautiful operation where several staff are waiting to show tourists through the real limestone caves where the wine is aged. Then a sparkling new tasting room -- all good-tasting wine (but maybe my tastebuds are out of practice) and gift shoppe.
We walk a few minutes out to the main highway and rapidly flag down a shared "service" minivan. We realize that our earlier ride to Baalbek on a nice new minivan was an anomaly -- this one is a smoky rattletrap (the smoke emanated mostly from the driver and passengers) that careened down the mountain, regularly squealing to a stop in hopes of gathering new paying passengers. At one point the driver held on to a lady's package in order to keep her from getting out of the van to take a competitor's ride. Although he tried to get us to pay double for a ride directly to our hotel, he dropped us at the Kuwaiti embassy where we got a regular taxi, freshened up at the hotel, then walked out to the cinema to see Adjustment Bureau. Always nice to see Matt Damon (Cole's lookalike), and I enjoy such intriguing sci-fi premises; and the NYC location was familiar, too.
After the movie, we walked back to American University of Beirut for a free concert hosted by the German embassy: a wind quintet of superb quality....

Comments

EUA: tanto estrago em tão pouco tempo

As part of my effort to learn about Portugal, both the country and the language, I'm subscribing to the centrist newspaper, O Publico . There are plenty of newspapers: conservative tabloids, and socialist and communist-sponsored daily papers; I find O Publico to be most sober, with consistently interesting columnists and opinion pieces, in addition to some local (Porto) news, with just enough sporting news to keep me chatting with the taxi driver. Today's opinion piece sums up, I think, European pundits' view of the U.S. government. As the title puts it: so much damage in so little time. I shudder at the rank incompetence and corrupt behavior, demonstrating a cynical attitude toward public service, showing indeed that the cruelty is the point. What scandal, what damage will be the tipping point to collapse this government? And what will it take to recover from the damage? Who will be able to trust the US government again, ever? Only ni...

Riding the Bus often

From 201010 Saudi scenes It is ironic that this land of cheap gasoline has so much group transport -- buses. From 201010 Saudi scenes Our housing compound has a Toyota-Coaster bus that takes some to/from school (we usually go earlier and return later, on a similar bus that the school provides). Driver Yahya takes residents on the 90-minute trip down to the Big City shopping every Thursday morning. The above picture shows our group one Thursday, usually going to Ikea or the new Lulu's Hypermarket , or the Dhahran Mall. Coleman rides a different bus every day to and from school -- usually 100 minutes there, 80 minutes back. His bus is evidently an old tourist bus, usually comfortable but a bit dusty. The air-conditioning usually works too well. I've ridden it with him several times, to attend business meetings at the district office. From 201010 Saudi scenes There he is, at 5:45am every morning, at the start of the bus run. Fortunately only about 20 stu...

Fleeing Trump, Americans go to Portugal

Fleeing Trump, Americans go into exile in Portugal. “I'm afraid to go back” Not only minorities feel threatened by the Trump administration. Three couples, a mother and an academic tell us why they chose to live in Portugal. Some say: the American dream is over. The above is today's headline article in our favorite trusted newspaper in Portugal, O Publico . It's a centrist newspaper, owned by a big supermarket corporation. Let's combine this with the recent news that Portugal's Air Force is now shifting away from its planned purchase of F-35 jets. Even though Trump has not even mentioned Portugal in his various diatribes against former allies, Portugal and the rest of Europe are reeling from the attacks. We hope it has the ironic effect of freeing Europe from American dominance and improving the chances for centrist leadership (against Trump-like parties that have been gaining prominence). The original text follows: Em fuga de Tru...

Thomas journals

Search This Blog